Munich - A test case to determine whether online service providers can be held responsible for what their customers see on the Internet went to court yesterday, with prosecutors accusing CompuServe's former German chief of distributing child pornography.
The charges against Mr Felix Somm stem from a December 1995 raid on the company's offices in Munich by Bavarian authorities investigating online pornography. US-based CompuServe responded to the raid by blocking access to some 200 electronic message boards for all of its then four million users worldwide, setting off an international debate over censorship.
In February 1996, CompuServe reinstated access to all but five of the boards and introduced software that would allow its customers to block out online pornography. But Bavarian officials criticised that action as an attempt to shift responsibility and continued their criminal investigation.